Hello and welcome to the Gifted Life Podcast where we have conversations about organ tissue and eye donation. I'm Joey Boudreau. Well, hi Joey. I'm Sally Gentry.
Hey Sally, we're going to kick this off without Lori today. Yes we are. Well, this is episode 79 of the Gifted Life Podcast. Can you imagine?
It's amazing. We're in our third year now and they haven't kicked you and I off yet. That's right. Well guys, we're at the end of National Kidney Month where we've had quite a bit of fundraisers here in Louisiana.
We've had the March Madness in Tibido and in nationwide we've had a ton between golf tournaments and walks and runs, all bringing about awareness to kidney health, kidney disease and of course those who are on the waiting list for a life saving kidney. And Joey, what a perfect way to let everyone know about donor awareness month, which is in April. A lot of events featuring a lot of different donor families, recipients and you know, I think along with this, when you were talking about National Kidney Month, the number of people we heard from in family services that you know, one to write, thank their donor families for their new kidney or kidneys. So obviously people are listening and they want to help and voice it a great thing.
March and April is so busy for us but such a busy time in a great week. Absolutely. As we've done in many other episodes, we've highlighted other OPOs, organ procurement organizations throughout the nation. This time we're highlighting the gift of life Philadelphia, which is one of the oldest and one of the largest organ recovery agencies, organ procurement organizations in the entire country.
Oh, that's wonderful. They do so many innovative things. That's right. And one of the innovating things we're going to find out about is the gift of life family house.
And I'm also going to talk about getting anxious. Yeah. Like I am very often Sally and as we do in every episode we'll be honoring a hero and of course we'll have our question and answer segment. As always, you guys know how to find us.
We're easy to find nowadays. That's right. If you've got any podcast app, whether it's Apple Podcast, Google Play or whatever your favorite podcast app might be, you can certainly find us. You can find us on social media, like us on Facebook, our Donate Life Louisiana page.
And you can follow us both on Twitter and Instagram at Donate Life LA. And don't forget Joey, always give us a call and that number is 5046483477. We might even play your message and we also would just like for you to call us and let us know how you think we're doing. That's right.
We want to hear from you. Ready to go? Yeah. In 2017, Donate Life America presented the Nicholas Green Award for a lifetime of giving to Howard M.
Nathan, president and CEO, gift of life donor program in Philadelphia in California. We are fortunate to have one of the icons in the industry. Someone I've seen many, many times get presentations at AOPO and different conferences. Mr.
Howard Nathan, how are you, Howard? I'm great. I'm great. I've been in the industry for 40 years.
This is his 40th anniversary here in 2018. That's wonderful. He started in 1978 as a transplant coordinator. In 1984, he became the president and CEO of Gift of Life there in Philadelphia.
Coincidentally, that's the same year of Nota National Organ Transplant Act. So Howard, you guys have been at the forefront in innovation and the amount of lives that are saved. And the amount of lives that you've had the most lives saved, what have you guys done throughout history to see such successes? Well, with 78, the transplant surgeons from five different hospitals, the people that always took an academic before that, and the idea is that yes, I did become the CEO.
But a couple of years ago, it was actually fantastic. Some of the team we have now, Bob, has been there 25 years. Whether there's people that really, they themselves see them as well. Outstanding commitment on everyone's part.
Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of history. It's always in 1984, the year I took over. So I changed the United Network for Organ Sharing, took over. And transplants, it was maybe a 50-50 change.
And then that changed everything when there was new medications was 85%. And now it's 93, 95% knowledge that has increased success. So we go from a time period of, in the 80s, as he's mentioning, where it was more experimental, especially with the medications and with the surgeries, with the techniques, to a time now, obviously, everything is so much more fine tuned. And again, you guys have been still with the forefront of the innovation in 2002.
It's where I started, and we started finding out about you guys because of the life institute shortly thereafter. What are some of the things that you've done in a more recent past that you saw were maybe still gaps in the industry? And that you saw, okay, this is a need, and these are areas that we'd like to address. So one of the team 94 actually received a liver, you know, pretty much every death in three years, creases.
That's incredible. But it also increased tissue, which we had never heard about before. It was asked for corny eggs, or didn't even know what tissue in those days. Tremendous increases in DCDs.
So in 1995, that's what that means. The way we offer things to families, and I think we began to teach and train people about how regulatory deaths don't are a year in the United States. So those are some major things that I remember, right? But the rest of the country.
You were instrumental in this change, and you guys there in Pennsylvania. My first introduction to Lopa here in Louisiana was in 1998 as an E-arners, and it came from that condition of participation. And then, you know, of course, like you said, it just, you've seen a huge increase, and then later with the collaborative with donor hospitals, transplant centers, and OPLs all getting together to see how we can close some caps. And so when I started, everything, you know, as far as education stemmed from a C1, D1, T1 approach, and then we did everything back then.
We were coordinators did, you know, hospital development, a little bit of family care, community, you know, and of course the coordinating part. And you saw this as an opportunity to create more systemic changes with the gift of life institute. You were the founder, am I correct? I was having and training people.
As far back as 1982, I was one of the founders of the NACCO training course, and I believe that, you know, the C1, D1, T1 doesn't necessarily work. You've really got a system. And the idea was to create a foundation that not only this country, but we've trained people from probably countries to teach and train some of these techniques in a better way to make sure that we started here is dead. It's definitely not going to survive before the past 1994 was the driver's license law that we were one of the first days to have a license.
Now we know that actually changes that we gave the consent. It has to be a carrying way. I think it's making sure that the US really does have, you know, we have 58 all the MOPOs and you know, we have staff in all aspects of the who are then, you know, told us the US 50 years ago, people doing it. It's not necessarily the general public.
It's really the hospitals. There's an old saying, well, you see Rob Banks. Money is. Yeah, that's right.
Well, why do we focus on hospital education? Well, that's where the donors are. It's very much a million people in the United States and your people, and people talk about 80, 20 in business so that people are... So as you're talking about donation and how you have educated individuals over time about this, how did this kind of evolve into the gift of life family house for recipients?
You know, I have been here, they Martha, had liver disease. You know, they called it non-A, non-B hepatitis. This was in the basically in the mid-80s and she was in it on, you know, my assistant's called PBC, primary concern of an unknown cause. Two and a half years because she was a B blood type until soon, and she got transplanted in 1991.
Then, yeah. And she said, well, I'm saying with my son, he's over there, blah, blah, blah. And the reality is, is that moment that, yeah, on the donation side, we do the right thing. We get her against her people.
But there's this whole other side of transplant that people on the organ procurement field that they experienced tonight. Yeah. And they told her their husband was going to be in the hospital, and that was 1991 house type of thing. And it's a place where there are 58 nights.
We had to turn people away. Oh, goodness. All 30 rooms were taken. So it's really benefited not only the patients and families, but last May, you know, waiting for the right.
And so the cool thing is every night at 6 p.m., the 50 or 60 people staying at the house, it really shows them what transplant. So there's more education going on? Correct. Yeah.
Always the key is education. And people, you know, so the people do want to help each other. That's what organ donation is about. And so this is just another ask.
They're waiting for a transplant. You have to book three much time for your group because it's so busy. That's great. We're quite proud of that.
Yes, indeed. So Howard, you guys obviously have done so much in so many different areas in donation. It's so great hearing you. You know, you're always one step ahead, I guess thinking about the next thing, what's on the horizon?
How can we impact this area in this area? What are the initiatives that you guys at gift of life have going on right now? You know, leadership. And so one of the things that nobody really knew in the early days and what would happen if they had off in 1990s, a thousand people, so that's a cool thing.
And I think that does that. I think we've done a lot of different cutting-edge C kidneys getting discarded, cutting out of people who had Hep C wanted to do this experiment in many centers. We've done three hand transits, including the only pediatric, so the people in New England involved are willing to help people. You know, they want to make that decision to donate.
They want to donate. So that makes us proud to be able to you and your people connected to what we do. Or you can't do it because it's because you know, you had a bad experience. You know, there's all those different, most life people of why they do what they do.
And I see thousands of people who are doing this work. You know, when I was doing it in the 70s, well, that's not the case anymore. And you know, your wins, you won't eat one years ago. You know, he was born on a down seven months later.
We got him a baby heart. He was seven months old, junior in college. I mean, you can't write that script. You know, that's real stuff.
And you know, we have this first DCD, you know, the mother of 14 years old. She wanted to be a donor. And then, well, about the DCD donation. You know, now there's over 2000 cases a year, almost, you know, three to four thousand trans months a year.
So it's those types of things that keep you going and you remember of why you do what you do. And now, you know, now I'm not directly involved day to day with clinical. Well, Howard, thank you so much. And you guys at Gift of Life are doing everything that you've done because it's truly impacted more lives than anyone and honestly put a finger on.
So thank you very much. Yes. We enjoyed the talk. Thanks.
As you may have heard in previous episodes, we've talked about some mental health issues. We've talked about suicide. We've talked about grief during the holiday seasons. And we want to make this a more regular part of our podcast.
And Sally, you know, mental health, obviously, and you know, is not something that everyone talks about very recently. It's been a big topic of conversation in the sports world. A couple of different athletes who are internationally known have come out with different types of mental illness and they've done so. So that others realize that they're not alone.
You know, so we want to make it, like I said, a regular part of our podcast and why not since we've got a mental health professional here with us, Miss Sally Gentry. Wow, that's great. Thanks, Joey. I do want to share with you my credentials so that way you know that I truly am a mental health professional.
I'm a licensed professional counselor. I also have a fellow status in the American, it's like a therapy association and I'm board certified professional counselor. And I've been doing this for around 30 years now. So I've got a little bit of experience plus a life experience and this all leads to anxiety.
You ever get anxious, Joey? I get anxious all the time, Sally. What do I do about it? I know and I think we all do.
And a lot of times we kind of let it get out of control though. And I know you know folks, I know folks, even I've done it myself. Oh my gosh, everything's like a taster fee. It's never going to get better or we have this all or nothing sort of thinking.
We tend to give other people credit for reading our minds and oh my gosh, they know what I'm thinking and now I know she thinks this about me or things like that that we have a tendency to do. We overgeneralize and I think all that just kind of stems from you know, we're getting caught up in the moment. The thing that I find very interesting is now that we have people coming forward that would never before have talked about this because many, many families have individuals who do have a mental illness and sometimes much more intense than just anxiety. It gets then into depression and much more difficult things in life.
And some of the things you see you know, and behavior, you know, you tend to be a little bit more irritable. You're a little bit more jumpy than usual because that anxiety is just really driving you. Sometimes excessive worry. You ever wake up at three o'clock and go, oh my gosh, I forgot to do this.
Oh, what if I don't finish that? What if- There you go. A lot of what ifs or shudders or couldows or I must or I need. A lot of that goes on.
Also one of the things I think that really concerns people is kind of a sense of impending doom at any moment. It's just the sky's going to fall. Something horrible is going to happen. And then I think too then physically you end up fatigued.
You kind of feel like you know, you're just kind of restless but at the same time you just can't get yourself going. These symptoms do include stress and the way out of this is to take a few moments to take a step back. And if you are able to and just go to someplace quiet even if it's just for a few moments and talk to yourself in a positive manner. I think that the positive thoughts can create a much more positive experience of life because if you're focusing in on, oh my gosh, I'm so anxious.
What am I going to do? It's just all the wrong thing. Then there's that tendency to perpetuate itself to go on and on and on. But those few moments of quiet time, some deep breathing, I know that all sounds so kind of superficial but it's amazing how those deep breaths can really help you know physiologically.
You can probably explain that much better than I can. Help relieve some of that anxiety. And remember folks, you know, overthinking can really ruin your ability for happiness. Sometimes a situation just is what the situation is.
And we don't have to try to turn it into something that it's not. So when you get anxious, take a step back, do a few deep breaths and think about the positive things to tell yourself that can be very helpful for you to relieve some of that anxiety. That's a lot of great information on how to treat yourself for anxiety. Is there any point where they should seek medical attention?
Oh, absolutely. If one is experiencing some sort of medical issues in their own life, the anxiety could be because of this medical problem that this person is already experiencing. So they definitely need to be speaking with a doctor about it. Trauma can be another reason or trauma can come in many different forms.
But that can also lead to severe depression if not treated by a professional. And also I think that there's a lot of financial issues or possibility of loss of job, things like that that can really kind of put one on over the edge so to speak that to seek professional help can really be beneficial at that point. So if you'd like more information on this or other topics, please go to lopa.org under our family services tab. We do have resources that addresses multiple issues that people may experience.
All right. Thank you very much, Sally. You're welcome. As we do in every episode of the gifted life, we honor our hero and this episode's hero is Evan Bunting.
Evan's mother writes, in June of 2012, I received a call that no mother ever wants to receive. It was a hospital calling telling me to come quickly. My only son was being rushed by ambulance to the hospital or severe injuries from a motorcycle accident. Unfortunately, God had a plan I wasn't prepared for.
As Evan's mom, he was only 20, a month shy of his 21st birthday. Evan's brain was not functioning and was declared brain dead the following day. A gift of life asked, would you consider donating his organs? The answer, for me, was absolutely.
I couldn't imagine a day without Evan in it. But to have his heart continued beating, to have his eyes continue to see, would truly have him live on in others. My life truly changed at this point. Evan was a hero.
Evan was a true blessing in so many unique ways. He lived every day to the absolute fullest and was the most kind, giving young man. His infectious smile, sense of humor, and let's have fun attitude, touched everyone and made them laugh. He was always working on a project whether it was a car, truck, motorcycle, mower, snowblower.
If it had a motor, he was on it. His friends knew he was the go-to guy. Evan had two sisters that miss him every day. Julian is two years older than Evan, and they were attached at the hip when they were little.
They shared the same sense of humor. Crystal, who is seven years younger than Evan, looked up to her big brother and he has deeply missed. And now we pause and say thank you to Evan for the gift of life. In the question and answer segment, we have a question from Facebook and Joey, this one's for you.
As a cancer survivor allowed to be an organ donor, I am currently but need to know if I need to remove the heart of my license since I had cancer in 2016. That's a great question and my first answer is don't remove your heart from your license. Obviously it changes with one cancer to another on time frames where it would be acceptable to transplant that person's organs. Obviously, if there's active cancer, that's a lot more challenging.
But after treatments and after the cancer has been eradicated for a period of time, then we re-evaluate on a case-by-case basis and oftentimes we do recover and transplant and save others' lives from cancer survivors. Great information, thank you. If you have a question, we want to hear from you. Reach out to us.
Your store can inspire others to give the gift of life. Find us on social media, email us or even call and leave a voicemail. Phone number is 504-648-3477. We look forward to hearing from you.
Wow, another episode comes to an end, Sally. This was really very good. I really enjoyed hearing what Howard had to say. Yeah, he is such an inspiration doing this for 40 years and always thinking about what's next.
You know, where can we create more innovation? Even though we didn't get a chance to talk with them about their family services program for the follow-up for donor families, they have an outstanding program and have for years. So that's something else that they're very good at doing too. It's something we didn't mention, but they are number one in the nation in lives saved from organ donation.
Last year, just this past year, 565 organ donors that have transplanted 1,546 organs. That's amazing. That is amazing. Wow.
And of course, if you haven't already done so, register to be an organ donor at registermead.org. Go out and do something today that you wouldn't normally do to help make life happen.